Astronomy Picture of the Day
Posted By admin On January 21, 2011 @ 10:27 pm In Photo Essays | Comments Disabled
[1]
Polar Ring Galaxy NGC 660
Image Credit & Copyright [2]: Stephen Leshin [3]
Explanation: NGC 660 lies near the center of this intriguing skyscape [4], swimming in the boundaries of the constellation Pisces [5]. Over 20 million light-years away, its peculiar appearance marks it as a polar ring galaxy [6]. A rare galaxy type, polar ring galaxies have a substantial population of stars, gas, and dust orbiting in rings [7] nearly perpendicular to the plane of the galactic disk. The bizarre configuration [8] could have been caused by the chance capture of material from a passing galaxy by the disk galaxy, with the captured debris strung out in a rotating ring. The polar ring component [9] can be used to explore the shape of the galaxy’s otherwise unseen dark matter halo [10] by calculating the dark matter’s [11] gravitational influence on the rotation of the ring and disk. Broader than the disk, NGC 660′s ring spans about 40,000 light-years.
Article printed from Recorder Online: http://www.berthoudrecorder.com
URL to article: http://www.berthoudrecorder.com/2011/01/21/astronomy-picture-of-the-day-3/
URLs in this post:
[1] Image: http://www.berthoudrecorder.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/PolarRingNGC660_LRGB_leshin.jpg
[2] Copyright: http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/lib/about_apod.html#srapply
[3] Stephen Leshin: http://sleshin.startlogic.com/
[4] this intriguing skyscape: http://sleshin.startlogic.com/stargazergallery/main.php?g2_itemId=391&g2_imageViewsIndex=0
[5] constellation Pisces: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pisces_(constellation)
[6] a polar ring galaxy: http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap070216.html
[7] orbiting in rings: http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap990510.html
[8] The bizarre configuration: http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0301391
[9] The polar ring component: http://www.obspm.fr/actual/nouvelle/apr03/prg.en.shtml
[10] dark matter halo: http://www.solstation.com/x-objects/darkhalo.htm
[11] dark matter’s: http://chandra.harvard.edu/xray_astro/dark_matter/index.html
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